Alex Scarrow - October skies

‘That’s the fella. He’s doing very well with his book, by the way.’

‘Lucky Tom.’

‘He’s really hooked by this. Wants to do something with us.’

‘Okay. He’s not going to hijack it, is he?’

‘No. But he may be a useful, authoritative talking head. It really depends whether we do a straight documentary, or a docu-drama, which is what Sean is suggesting. Anyway, Tom’s convinced Preston is some kind of whacked-out religious nut-job.’

‘That’s hardly a difficult diagnosis.’

Julian laughed. ‘Nope. But he made some very interesting comparisons with other similar whacked-out nuts from history. It’ll make for a good angle to play around with. Plus his reputation carries some authority. If he’s happy to say Preston’s a sociopathic killer prepared to murder all his followers just to satisfy delusions of destiny, then-’

‘He said that?’

‘Yup.’

Rose felt the skin on her arms tingle. ‘Oh my God.’

‘It is kind of creepy, isn’t it?’

She wondered whether to confess to Julian exactly how spooked she was beginning to feel about the whole thing.

‘What we may have, according to Tom, is one of the earliest, most detailed accounts of a serial killer going about his business, courtesy of our good friend Lambert.’

‘Julian?’

‘Yeah?’

‘It gets better.’

Better or… weirder?

Rose didn’t like the fact that the story was beginning to get to her.

‘How so?’

‘I’m almost certain one of the Preston party emerged from the hills,’ she said.

‘What?’

‘I’ve been following up on some of the Blue Valley folklore. There’s an account of a survivor who emerged the spring after Lambert’s diary entries, emaciated, at death’s door, and quite out of his mind by the sound of it. ’

‘Who?’

‘Well, that’s the mystery. It was a man. They called him the Rag Man. He never gave a name. They nursed him back onto his feet and he left Blue Valley early April 1857. Then I picked up his trail in a town called Fort Casey, about forty miles north-west, where he attracted some attention. He entered the town and a curious reporter tried to collar him for an interview.’

She read the article to Julian.

‘That’s really quite weird,’ he said.

‘Isn’t it?’

‘But how can we be sure it’s someone from the Preston party?’

‘We can’t. But Blue Valley, Pelorsky’s Farm, was well off the beaten track for emigrants. The only people back then that they encountered were trappers and traders and occasional Indians. It’s too big a coincidence that a starving white man emerged from the mountains a few months after those people got caught by the snow, don’t you think?’

‘Hmm.’

‘And that article was dated mid-April. So it would fit the timescale of someone making forty miles westward on foot.’

‘You know, having a mysterious survivor emerge from the mountains and into enigmatic obscurity would really add a lot to our story.’

‘It certainly would,’ she replied.

‘Whoever it was.’

‘Yeah.’

‘If that person survived… what if that man had children?’

‘It would be one helluva coup to track down a descendant and interview him or her.’

‘Yes,’ said Julian. ‘Look, we’ve got quite a few names from Lambert’s journal: Keats, Weyland, Preston, Bowen, Larkin, Zimmerman, Stolz, Stolheim… to name just a few. It would be worth a shot, if you’re up for it, to comb through the archived press of the time, like you did in Fort Casey.’

‘That’ll be like looking for a needle in a haystack.’

‘Maybe. But we could filter this down a bit. If this Rag Man was headed north-west, there were only a few destinations for him back then, weren’t there? I mean, you had Portland, Astoria and Fort Vancouver. None of those settlements would have been that big back then, perhaps only a few thousand. If we ran all the names mentioned in Lambert’s journal through their local press archives, their parish records, we might get a hit.’

‘True.’

‘And I’ll help you with this, as soon as I join you out there. Meantime, I’m going to follow Preston’s trail. I mentioned to you there’s a guy out there on the internet who’s set up a page on Preston?’

‘Yeah, I saw your mail.’

‘There’s an email address on his page. I’m going to see if we can squeeze him for some detail.’

‘Be careful, Jules,’ Rose blurted.

‘Uh?’

‘Well, you know, don’t sound too interested. Who knows? It might be another journalist who’s on the same story.’

Julian chuckled. ‘I’ll be sure to sound extremely casual about everything.’

Then the conversation came to an unexpected halt. This time Rose stepped in. ‘So when are you coming back?’

‘I booked a flight back on Friday. We should arrange with Grace to have another visit up to the site. See what other bits and pieces we can dig up.’

‘She won’t like it if I say it like that.’

‘Well, obviously we’re not going to run a JCB across the place — just a little trowel work, that’s all. Actually, having read most of the journal, I think I understand the layout of that clearing. I think it’d be a cinch, for example, to locate Preston’s shelter.’

‘Yes?’

‘And’ — Julian let slip a nervous chuckle — ‘who knows what crazy stuff we’ll find if we do, hmm?’

Rose shuddered. ‘Spooky stuff.’

‘Oh, that’s for sure.’

26 October, 1856

He listened to the howling wind outside, knowing that it was bringing with it many inches of snow that would be covering the entrance to the shelter. But it was a warm shelter, so much better than the hastily erected lean-tos down the hillside in the clearing. A good place from which to do work.

Yes.

A good place to become something more. He looked around at the tools hanging from lumber nail hooks; sharp tools, unused for many decades. On the floor beneath them nestled an ancient-looking flintlock weapon, from another time, perhaps even a previous century — no good to anyone now. The tools, however, he could use.

You are strong.

The voice inside him made him shiver with delight.

I hope so.

He looked down at the canvas sack of bones; daring to pull open the threaded mouth of the bag, he glimpsed the small cluster of dark-coloured, almost black bones inside.

You came to me.

Yes. I chose you. The other was wicked.

Preston.

You are a good man.

I try so hard to be.

He resumed his work with the sharp tools — the dry brittle scrape of metal on dry bone. Rasp… rasp… rasp.

You will help me?

I will.

We can help each other, can’t we?

Yes.

He resumed his work, shards of bone gathering on the dry earth floor at his feet — his work at becoming.

28 October, 1856

It has been some days since the split. I am losing track of how many days now. I think I might be wrong on today’s date, but how would I know?

We are like two tribes now, warily regarding each other across a rapidly diminishing island of ox meat. The others will no longer take Keats’s supervision on the sharing of the meat. They help themselves too readily to what’s there, and even I can see that this store of food will be exhausted long before the snow clears.

Keats and Broken Wing have attempted to forage for additional food, but there is little that one can feed on during the winter.

What we fear now is that the others will decide not to share the oxen any longer. That surely is a matter of certainty.

Ben shuddered with the cold seeping relentlessly through his poncho, seeping into and tightening his fingers so that it made holding his pen difficult.